Indigenous Religious Traditions in Five Minutes - Molly Bassett
69. What are ancestor spirits, and what role do they play in Hawaiian religious life?
Indigenous Religious Traditions in Five Minutes - Molly Bassett
Marie Alohalani Brown [+]
University of Hawaiʻi-Mānoa
Marie Alohalani Brown, a Kanaka ʻŌiwi (Hawaiian), is an Associate Professor in the Department of Religion at the University of Hawaiʻi-Mānoa, specialist in Hawaiian religion. Her research is primarily carried out in 19th- and 20th-century Hawaiian-language materials. Her works include Facing the Spears of Change: The Life and Legacy of John Papa ʻĪʻī, which won the biennial Palapala Poʻokela Award for the best book on Hawaiian language, culture, and history (2016, 2017); The Penguin Book of Mermaids (2019) for which she is co-editor along with Cristina Bacchilega; and Ka Poʻe Moʻo Akua: Hawaiian Reptilian Deities (forthcoming, 2022).
Description
Ancestral spirits termed ʻaumākua play a significant role in Hawaiian religious life, and speak to the Hawaiian belief that death can never truly separate the living from the dead. ʻAumākua are a category of akua (deities), some of whom may take the form or flora or fauna, or elemental phenomena.